Today, we began with our Days of the Week song. then, we worked on notes about the day of the week. Sam drew images for each day that will help her to relate and personalize the Spanish words for the days. Next. we learned six important words: today, yesterday, tomorrow, is, was, and if. We then used those new words to translate sentences about the days of the week and their sequence.

Worked on correcting sentences for punctuation and grammar. Read Hoot.

Today was our first session together, so we just used it to get to know each other. I told her a little bit about myself and then she told me about herself! It turns out that we both can draw very well and Sam was immediately interested in my Manga drawing skills! Next, I asked her to tell me about what she already knew in Spanish and I gave her some short, simple oral assessments. She has mastered her numbers 1-15 and also her Spanish greetings. Next class, we will begin a unit on days of the week.

The session began with a basic facts (addition) game with cards. Samantha had to mentally compute sums. During this game the distributive property of multiplication was reviewed. Samantha completed several problems requiring estimation and problem solving. For the remainder of the session she used linking cubes to create and solve geometric pattern problems.

Samantha recited the sounds for several consonants, short vowels and digraphs. The concept of bonus letters was discussed. Several words were built using the magnetic tiles. Samantha was asked to read the words (many of them were nonsense words). The concept of tapping unknown words was also discussed. The word cards from steps 1.3 and 1.4 were read by Samantha. For the final portion of the session Samantha was introduced to reading and charting words. This lesson will continue at the next session.

Samantha began the session with a game of multiplication war. She reviewed the distributive property of multiplication. Next we solved several problems involving number sequences, tables and word problem solving. For the final part of the session, Samantha worked independently on word problems.

"Peaceful Piggy Meditation" book; lavender spray project; calming breaths; lotus pose with variations; hero pose, fire log pose; obstacle course. We first made our calming lavender spray with lavender essential oil and water. Sam now has her own spray. We then read the "Peaceful Piggy Meditation" book and discussed meditation and calming. We practiced deep breathing and meditation. Sam did very well at this. Our active part of class was lotus, fire log, and hero poses. The last part of class we built creative obstacle courses which incorporated yoga poses and other body movements.

We started to create a map of the USA out of clay in order to learn the important landforms, from the Great Lakes and rivers to the different mountain ranges and the Great Plateau.

Today Sam started class summarizing what was read yesterday and deciding that she would record our read aloud in Arabic on her iPad. She completed 12 recall questions quickly aloud then we reviewed active reading strategies on the white board and realized that the prediction factor is moot as she has already read Hoot, so we will focus more on inferring meaning. Next, we team-read through the end of chapter 2. At the end, she independently completed five recall/check questions, questioned the author ("Why did they include the big girl?"), and connected with the text ("people being mean to me") then we began chapter 3 and when class ended the remainder of chapter 3 was assigned for homework.

Sam started class correcting grammar sentences on the board with multiple errors in capitalization, spelling, end marks, and dialogue. She seemed to enjoy this activity. I ordered Hoot Friday and we will begin studying that book as soon as it arrives. In the meantime we are reading from her Open Court curriculum. Today we read actively through a story titled Salt, prior to reading we visited the storyboard components and focus questions, as well as predicted. Throughout the story, Sam predicted what would happen next. We also stopped periodically to summarize and question the characters' actions and decisions. At the end, Sam completed a storyboard on her white board that summarized the main conflict and resolution of the plot. She also identified the main and secondary characters and the setting. Last, she revisited the focus questions and discussed luck vs smart business.